Welcome to Death 2 Engfish, a blog designed to enlighten students about English, and more specifically, the English department at the University of Central Arkansas. The majority of the blog posts will be devoted to the discussion of the areas in which UCA's English department can be improved and the ways in which some sort of change can be administered.
Ken Macrorie defines Engfish as "a language in which fresh truth is almost impossible to express." He further explains it as "a feel-nothing, say-nothing language, dead like Latin, devoid of rhythms of contemporary speech. A dialect in which words are almost never 'attached to things,' as Emerson said the should be."
So what the hell does that mean? Engfish is the language students use to "b.s." research papers that they care nothing about. Engfish is meaningless regurgitation written for tell me what this means essay tests. Engfish is academic dialect that English students are forced to use when talking about texts that range from classical to post-modern.
Why does it matter? Because it's hard to truly learn about literature when you are never asked or allowed to write about it how you would really talk about it. Or when the focus is only on interpretation, not immitating the authors. It's like sports: you don't really know everything about a sport unless you've tried playing it.
As English majors or minors--or just visiting English students--you have the right to offer your own interpretation of a text without having it rejected! Too often professors just want to lecture their own interpretation of a work, leaving no room for opposing theories or for healthy classroom discussion.
Writing is a free expression of ideas, thoughts, and feelings. Writing is Literature and Literature is formed by Writing. So...it should be explored and taught as freely as it is formed.
It's 2009. My cell phone is touch screen, and my president is black...but English classes just aren't changing. It's time to catch up. It's time for professors to stop teaching like they're reading from scrolls and for students to realize that this is not the way it's supposed to be. Literature is crying out from the Norton Anthology pages to be liberated!
How about a revolution? Maybe all that can be done is some serious head-turning. But maybe not. Maybe a whisper can turn into hum...into a rattle...into a ROAR. The same generation of people that elected Barack Obama president should be able to bring about some more Change, don't you think?
Comment or email Death2Engfish@gmail.com to see what you can do to help start the revolution.
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"It's like sports: you don't really know everything about a sport unless you've tried playing it."
ReplyDeleteAnd what I assume you shall assume...
I want to learn in a class where every student response is not given in the form of a question-- "It's about death...?"-- because they're too afraid of being told they're wrong. Actually, it is about death, in a way, and a million other things that the footnotes don't point you towards.
ReplyDeleteIt's really sad that most professors don't want to actually discuss the literature. They just love the sound of their own voice; it's like they get some sort of a high from preaching when they should be teaching.
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